


Help Wanted

by astrangebird



Series: Growing and Changing [3]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Caleb has a crush, Emotional Constipation, Gen, M/M, Nott the goblin mom, Relationship Advice
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-23
Updated: 2019-04-23
Packaged: 2020-01-24 07:35:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18566833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/astrangebird/pseuds/astrangebird
Summary: “When you first met Yeza, when did you…” He trails off for a moment, embarrassing himself before he’s even got the question out, “How did you know that you wished to pursue him…” He takes a deep breath, “Romantically.”Or, Caleb asks Nott for advice dealing with his feelings.





	Help Wanted

“Nott, could I speak with you a moment?” Caleb whispers into his hands, the copper wire vibrating between his fingers as he sends a message to Nott across the common room of the tavern. Nott is at a table near the bar with Yeza pressed close to her side across from Jester and Caduceus. He’s starting to come out of his shell a bit now that he’s fairly certain he won’t be heading back to jail anytime soon and that the Nein seem intent on feeding him until he pukes. Currently he’s examining the strange pink lichen that seems to grow on everything that Caduceus owns, turning his shield over in his hands looking at the variations of it under different light and occasionally getting in close with a magnifying glass. It looks like he’s speaking a mile a minute. Nott looks like she understands what he’s talking about, watching him fondly as she twirls the end of Yeza’s vest between her fingers. Jester is at least pretending to understand, poor Caduceus looks like he’s only just this side of conscious.

Caleb has sequestered himself at a corner table with a number of books and notably blank paper before him, his usually frantic note taking has slowed to a crawl as he seems to have found himself… distracted. 

Nott’s ears perk up, unconsciously looking for the sourceless sound of his voice before he hears her whisper back, “Of course.”

She whispers something in Yeza’s ear before giving him a quick kiss to his temple and hopping down from her chair. Yeza seems to acknowledge whatever Nott has said before returning his attention to the shield.

“Are you alright, Caleb?” Nott asks as she situates herself across from him, attempting to find a paperless part of the table to set her comically large stein of ale.

“I’m fine, thank you. But uhm, I was hoping that I could ask you for some advice.” Caleb fidgeted with the copper wire, twirling it around a finger.

“Advice? About what? I-I don’t think I would be of much help with your studies.” She waves her hand over the table full of arcane symbols and Caleb’s scrawled Zemnian notes, most of it likely incomprehensible to her.

“No no it’s not about magic, I was looking for advice on more… personal matters.” He feels his whole body tense and he squeezes his eyes shut, immediately regretting asking because now he actually has to talk about it. 

Nott’s brows pull together and she suddenly looks very serious, “Has Fjord been bossing you around again?”

“No mother, the other boys aren’t picking on me,” Caleb sighs and gives Nott a fond smile and she relaxes back into her chair, chuckling at his tone.

“I want to ask you a personal question, but you don’t have to answer if you feel uncomfortable.” Caleb worries the wire around another finger.

“What do you want to know?” Nott’s brows draw together again as she watches him, patiently waiting for him to figure out how to word his question. He’s grateful for her unending patience with his struggle with words.

“When you first met Yeza, when did you…” He trails off for a moment, embarrassing himself before he’s even got the question out, “How did you know that you wished to pursue him…” He takes a deep breath, “Romantically.”

With all the stopping and starting it didn’t even have the tone of a question anymore. Caleb hadn’t even realized that he had closed his eyes again while speaking until he had to open them to look at Nott.

He can see her crunching numbers and searching his face for clues before she leans in conspiratorially, concern coloring her features once more. “It’s not that drow, is it? I don’t like him. I won’t give you any advice if it’s him.” 

“It is not him.” It takes all of Caleb’s self control to keep his eyes locked firmly on hers and not look over at the other table.

“Good!” Nott replies brightly, perhaps with more relief than was absolutely necessary but that is neither here nor there. She settles herself in her chair with her glass in hand and looks over wistfully at Yeza and lets out a sigh. 

“I’m not sure there was a, uh, a single moment, not one I could point at and- and say ‘this is when I knew’. I think it was a bit more gradual than that. We had known each other for a while, he had always been kind to me, he’s very handsome,” Nott looks sheepishly into her glass, “At least to me, anyway.” They share a quiet chuckle before she continues again.

“But I think it’s more something you know with your gut, you know? Not something you use your smarts for. You can talk yourself out of a lot of stuff if you let your head get in the way all the time.” She finishes her thought with a big gulp from her nearly empty glass.

Nott would know a lot about thinking her way out of doing things, she spent a lot of gold on a flask to help her avoid doing just that. Caleb looks over at the other table, hoping that Nott will think that he is merely mulling over her words instead of looking at… anyone in particular. It seems that Jester and Caduceus have decided to stop pretending to be interested in the scientific babble that’s still pouring out of Yeza because Caduceus looks like he’s actually awake again. Jester is flailing her arms about wildly as she talks and Caleb manages to catch a few words that indicate that she’s describing a particularly revolting creature they’ve encountered before. Caduceus watches her with fond amusement, interjecting now and then but mostly just watching the show that Jester seems to be performing for him. There’s a moment when Caduceus lets out a hearty laugh, his baritone voice carrying over the din of the tavern as his face breaks into a wide smile. His whole body shakes with his laughter as he clutches his stomach with one hand and the table with the other. The pink curtain of his hair flutters forward as he bends to catch his breath.

Caleb’s stomach clenches uncomfortably and he wrenches his eyes away from the other table to look down at his long abandoned notes. He can feel his whole body burn white hot and hopes that he isn’t as flushed as he feels. Caleb taps his fingers rhythmically on the table, hoping to calm himself down before giving Nott some kind of response.

“Well, if feeling like one might vomit counts as ‘knowing with your gut’ then I suppose I have my answer.” Caleb looks up at Nott cautiously through the fringe of his hair, nearly wishing he hadn’t said anything.

“Oh, well vomiting seems a little extreme but I suppose that counts.” She watches him carefully, as if she’s worried he might actually throw up on her.

Caleb drops his head into his hands, scrubbing at his eyes and groaning down at the table. He wasn’t sure what kind of answers he was hoping to get out of this conversation but being faced with his own long suppressed emotional responses to things wasn’t it. How did pack bonding for survival turn into romance?

“What do I do, Nott?” Caleb whines into his hands, peaking out between his fingers to see Nott smiling at him fondly. 

“Honey, that’s up to you to decide.”

“Can’t you just tell me?” He drags his hands down his face in exasperation and Nott laughs at hearing her own words turned back at her.

“Well, you’ve got two options; you can ignore it and hope the feeling goes away, or you can confront this person and see if they would be interested in you in that way.” She said it so simply, as if there was nothing else to consider. Maybe there wasn’t and Caleb was just overthinking things again.

“I’m not so good at dealing with these kinds of things. Too in my head a lot of the time,” Caleb mumbles.

“Sometimes you’ve got to listen to your other parts, too. Your brain can only get you so far when it comes to matters of the heart.” Nott reaches across the table and places her small clawed hand on top of his. Caleb turns his hand over in her grasp and smiles down at the comically large difference between them. 

“You are so much smarter than me, my friend,” He closes his other hand over hers and squeezes gently on her tiny fingers.

Nott squeezes his hand back and smiles fondly over at Yeza, “I think I just have a bit more experience in following my heart. It’s served me well so far.” 

“Indeed it has,” Caleb keeps her hand in his and looks over at the others. Yeza has given Caduceus his shield back and looks completely enthralled by whatever tale Jester is spinning for him, clutching her holy symbol as she shouts AND I TOLLED THE DEAD across the tavern. The room quiets and turns to look at her. 

Caduceus, who doesn’t even have to stand to be seen over the heads of the other patrons just waves to the room and says in his slow drawl, “Just tellin’ a story, don’t mind us.”

The conversations pick back up and most turn their attention away from the very boisterous tiefling who continues telling her story like nothing happened. Caduceus scans the room as the other patrons go back to their business and locks eyes with Caleb, smiling that slow smile of his and gives him a wave. Caleb feels his skin prickle with the beginnings of another flush and he automatically picks up one of his hands from Nott’s and waves back, a small smile of his own coming to his lips unbidden. Caduceus’ smile grows coy before he turns his attention back to Jester and her tale. Caleb brings his hand back to Nott’s and finds her looking at him like she’s just caught him with his hand in the cookie jar. And, well, she’s not wrong.

Nott clears her throat in that indelicate way of hers, looking at Caleb over the last dregs of her ale, ”SO! What about that Caduceus though?” 

Caleb groans and pulls his hands away from hers as he thumps his head down onto the table to the sound of Nott cackling into her cup.


End file.
